Deer hunters: Sometimes you 'gotta' move

By Oak Duke

Monday

Nov 20, 2017 at 9:24 PMNov 20, 2017 at 9:24 PM

Those of us who pursue whitetails usually wait for the wary critters to walk by, and we call it "hunting from a stand" or "stand hunting." But there are a few others of us who at times choose to "still hunt."

Sure, many deer have been taken from a stand.

But many tags have been filled whether by bow hunting or with a gun while the hunter was "on the move" - "still hunting."

Most deer hunters do not feel confident hunting deer unless they are in a stand and motionless. They believe that they make too much noise and move too much to be able to "sneak up on" a whitetail.

"Still hunting" requires an element of faith beyond "stand hunting."

When hunting from a stand, patience is more than a virtue, it's the virtual formula for success.

When we stalk deer, we see the animals and then move on them, but when we are still-hunting, we assume and hope the deer are in an area, but are not able to verify it with empirical evidence.

Hunters who lack confidence may find it helpful to consider "still hunting" as simply hunting from a moveable stand - a very, very slow moving stand.

Many successful "still hunters" nowadays are camouflaged from head to toe. We blend with the environment as never before. And when we are motionless and in front of the right background, we become all but invisible to deer.

Deer are good at picking out any motion, especially quick movement, but have a difficult time discerning motionless or gently moving forms.

It amazes me that sometimes, moving gently back and forth, swaying like the wind blown branches, actually puts whitetails at ease sometimes. I've used that trick a number of times, just before I released an arrow.

The "still hunter" moves very slowly, a few steps and then waits, listening. Then we take a few more steps and actually can be quieter than the deer, squirrels, or other critters of the woods.

Never take more than three steps at a time, before a pause.

When "still hunting," the hunter moves quietly and slowly through the deer range. More whitetails are seen this way than by hunting from a stand. But we also spook deer too. But I often wonder how many deer are spooked by our scent while we sit in a stand. But we never know they are there, downwind out of sight.

Hunters who are new to the sport would do well to learn to "still hunt" as they begin to "stand hunt." One of the additional benefits in "still hunting" is the knowledge we gain and acquire as we move through the deer range.

Hunters who only travel directly to a stand, believing that this is the only way for them to be successful, miss out on a lot of the pleasure of hunting, which is also learning. It's easy to forget what's important in our overpowering desire to fill a tag.

One of the central themes of hunting is to learn about nature and how we move in relation to it. It's an old saw, but never more true: Hunting is more than killing deer.

The only way we learn where and when is by getting out there and moving through the woods - not by being locked into a favorite tree as if we were married to it.

Good places to "still hunt" vary from year-to-year just as do tree stands, mostly dependent upon the seasonal shift of food. Acorns may be most important one year, but the next year a cornfield could be the major key food source for the whitetails. And on the next it might be beechnuts or apples.

One of my favorite techniques is to "still hunt" along an old lease road (oil lease here in the Southern Tier of NY or Northern tier counties of Pa.) or gas, electric right-of-way, or logging road that cuts through the thickest cover around.

That's right - the thickest, thorn-choked, noisy, nasty cover that you can find, but move next to it, not through it. Of course, avoid making noise, crunching leaves and snapping sticks.

My chosen path is perpendicular - 90 degrees to the whitetail's assumed path and into or quartering (cutting across) the wind.

I rely on my ears almost as much as my vision when "still hunting." Taking old pathways such as right-a-ways and lease roads, allows the "still hunter" to move much more quietly than the deer. Whitetails will crunch the leaves, grunt during the rut, and make quite a racket, often tipping us off to their whereabouts.

It's actually surprising how noisy deer can be, especially when they are moving as a group, feeding and rutting.

But just as important as a good "still hunting" path is the direction of the wind.

A "still hunter" needs to be cognizant of the wind direction at all times.

A good "still hunting" location should not be attempted when the wind is blowing the wrong way, and hitting the hunters back. The better the hunter knows the woods, such as being aware of clearings and shooting corridors ahead on the trail, the more the advantage swings toward the hunter.

On some days the wind is swirling and seems to come from every direction. On those days, take a stand.

But when the wind is right and conditions are perfect, there might be no more effective way to hunt a whitetail than to obey that voice in your head that says, "I gotta move."

Oak Duke writes a weekly column appearing Sunday in The Spectator.

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